Telangana High Court slaps fine on chief secretary for second time in a row

HYDERABAD: In a major jolt to the state executive, the Telangana High Court on Monday directed Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar, also the Chief Commissioner of Land Administration (CCLA), to pay Rs 25,000 to P. Laxminarayana Reddy, an ex-servicemen, within two weeks and also give possession of four acres of land in Survey No. 118 of Yenkepally village of Vikarabad district.

Failing this, Chief Secretary has to appear before the court at the next hearing and explain why the order was not complied with.

This is the second time that the court imposed a fine on the revenue secretary for not obeying the court orders. He already paid Rs 20,000 to Laxminarayana Reddy in another contempt case for not implementing orders of a single judge bench.

A division bench comprising Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy was dealing a contempt case filed by Laxminarayana Reddy, who said revenue officials had not handed over the possession of four acres of land which was allocated to him under the ex-servicemen quota in 2010. As the possession was not handed over, the ex-servicemen knocked the doors of the High Court. A single judge bench directed the revenue department to hand over the possession of the land. When it was not complied with, the single judge bench imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 on the revenue secretary.

While the issue stood like that, the government filed an appeal before the division bench, stating that it was the mistake of the ex-serviceman as he did not take possession and cultivated the land allocated to him within three years from the date of allocation.

After examining the records, the court came to know that apart from allocation of land on papers, no physical possession of land was handed over to the ex-serviceman, by giving demarcation or any other proceedings. Closing the appeal, the court directed the authorities on June 15 this year to hand over the actual physical possession of land to the ex-serviceman within two weeks. As these orders were not complied by the authorities, Laxminarayana Reddy filed the contempt case.